


Two Weeks of Fluff for Bee

by Kizzywiggle



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: A good cup of tea, Blatant misuse of government equipment, Blatant misuse of pokemon too, But only for research, Feels again because I like feels, Fluff without Plot, Hideous bastard mashup, Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy References, Hurt/Comfort, I'm sorry please forgive me, James has the hump, James is not at ALL BAMF outside of work, Light BDSM, M/M, Misbehaving in a lift, More Barbara Cartland M/M fluff, Never piss off Q, Not-quite-kink, Other, Q's desk - Freeform, Sherlock isn't good at people, Tattoos, The Honour of MI6, Trees, overheard on comms, worse misuse of war poetry
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-07-25
Updated: 2016-08-03
Packaged: 2018-07-26 15:52:28
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 6,485
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7580515
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kizzywiggle/pseuds/Kizzywiggle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Things aren't always as they seem.</p><p>Both Mrs Hudson and Sherlock learn not to make assumptions.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. For the Purpose of My Research

**Author's Note:**

> This *was* going to be smut when I sat down to write, then it turned into yet more fluff-feelz. But minimal angst, so I'm calling this progress...
> 
> Part of my self-imposed Two Weeks of Fluff for Bee series - more to come in this fandom, plus 00Q and Bagginshield (probably).

Mrs Hudson called up the stairs. “Boys? _Boys!_ You’ve got a parcel!”

Hearing no reply, she started up the stairs, skirt swishing around her calves as she climbed. She paused to catch her breath on the little landing outside their door, and as she inhaled she heard muffled, rhythmic grunts and groans and “Dammit, John!” sounding clearly through the door. With a happy little grin, Mrs Hudson rapped on the door before leaving the parcel where they could find it easily, and tapped back downstairs to make a nice cup of tea. 

Inside 221b Baker Street, things were perhaps not _quite_ as sweet, optimistically romantic Mrs Hudson imagined, however. 

Sherlock _was_ , at that moment, tied naked and facedown to the kitchen table, yes.

And John Watson _was_ beating (if a little reluctantly) upon the bare and quivering buttocks of said Consulting Detective with a flogger made of soft black leather.

And Sherlock, indeed, _was_ grunting and groaning as John passed the flogger over his flesh, but it wasn’t with anything _like_ the carnal bliss which dear Mrs Hudson fondly imagined…

“Dammit, John!”

Sherlock strained awkwardly in his bonds, desperately trying to crane his head round to look at John. His flared, elegant nostrils were pinched tight with displeasure and even whiter than usual with the force of his fury. Crystalline eyes attempted to shoot daggers at his lacklustre punisher, but John neatly moved out of Sherlock’s eyeline, denying him that control. Sherlock’s head sagged back to the table, the warmed-up varnish coating the wood grabbing and releasing the flesh of his torso with painful little sucks as he moved. “Dammit, John,” he repeated, but without heat this time, “All I require is for you to _attempt_ to beat me in the manner in which we ascertained the murderer did. You are, I calculate, of like enough build and stature, that we should quickly be able to corroborate my hypothesis. But not,” he attempted to crane his head round again, the table slurping painfully at his groin and nipples as he did so, “If you persist in this half-hearted manner!”

John lobbed the flogger at Sherlock’s head, missing by a deliberately narrow margin (he was, after all, an excellent shot). “No,” he replied.

“Oh, really, John, now is hardly the time to come over all delicate!” Sherlock mocked. “The only other person I know of similar physique is Anderson, and I’m hardly likely to let _him_ near my unguarded posterior, even to prove myself right!” He squirmed in his bonds once more and waited longer than he liked for a reply. “Well, then, if you are unable to assist, kindly release me. John?” 

There was the scrape of chair legs on linoleum, and the thump of John sitting down, then more silence.

Well, not silence, exactly. Sherlock’s hyperaware senses parsed the ticking of three separate clocks in the flat (one incrementally out-of-sync), the hysterical buzz of a fly trapped behind a curtain, an argument happening on the street outside, Mrs Hudson’s phone ringing - it would be a cold-caller, it always was, at this time of day, yet despite Sherlock having informed her of this many, _many_ times, he still heard her answering the call - a busker playing sax forlornly on the street corner. He could feel his skin, unpleasantly warm on the front, brushed with goosepimples on the back; cramp beginning in his left hip where the joint was being held at an unnatural angle for too long; sweat trickling from his hairline and down his aristocratic nose to hang from the tip. His mouth was dry, Sherlock realised suddenly, and his head was beginning to hurt. He closed his eyes and exhaled a shaky breath. Now that he wasn’t focussed on the experiment he felt dangerously close to being overwhelmed by the sensory input. 

The chair scraped again, and air whooshed over Sherlock’s skin as John moved around to stand at his head, where he crouched, cradling Sherlock’s jaw with a square, capable hand. The callouses formed on his dominant hand chafed exquisitely, and Sherlock fought to suppress a shiver of baffled arousal. He didn’t understand his body, sometimes. “Sherlock, open your eyes,” John said quietly. 

Sherlock opened his eyes, falling into the sombre gaze of his best friend and partner-in-crimefighting. John was for once entirely serious, no glint of humour at all in his eyes as he spoke. “I need you to listen to me,” Sherlock nodded. John began untying the ropes which held Sherlock captive as he continued. “When I have untied you, you will stand up and put your hands behind your back and stand with your feet shoulder-width apart. You will keep your head up, your eyes on me, and your breathing even. Do you understand me, Sherlock?”

Sherlock nodded dumbly. What was this? 

“Words, Sherlock, I need to hear the words. Do. You. Understand. Me?” 

“I...yes, John,” Sherlock replied with none of his usual attitude. For once he was confused and unable to predict what was coming. His bonds loosed, John rubbed briskly at Sherlock’s limbs, massaging them until they glowed pink with healthy blood flow. He smiled a small, pleased grin.

“Excellent. Sherlock, stand, please.”

Sherlock stood with John’s assistance, responding to the tone of John’s voice, the whisper of command an excruciating tickle across his racing synapses. He lifted his chin and rested his gaze on John, tracking with his eyes as John dragged out one of the kitchen chairs and sat on it, legs spread wide, hands on his thighs, rubbing minutely. Wanting to make sense of the tension he saw, Sherlock gave John a lightning-fast once-over, eyes widening when he saw the outline of John’s semi-hard cock tenting his trousers. _What…?_ he wondered, then jerked his eyes back up to John’s face. “We need to talk,” John said drily. 

It didn’t occur to Sherlock that he was stood, at ease, buck naked, in the middle of his kitchen in broad daylight. He stood, he looked, and he listened, every single one of his hyperactive neurons completely trained on the man sat before him. “I’m listening, John,” he said with unaccustomed humility.

“As you can tell - actually, probably tell, being you - from looking at me, I am aroused, Sherlock,” John stated. “I’m _not_ gay, but I _am_ bi, and I do have a dominant kink. Working so closely with you for these months has been difficult, because, well, a,” he grinned, “You’re bloody gorgeous,” (Sherlock blushed, feeling the colour race from his high cheekbones down his neck and across his collarbones) “And b, every time you give me that know-it-all attitude I want to fuck you into happy silence.” John casually stroked a hand up his thigh and palmed his erection with a light squeeze. “Having you tied to the table and being asked to flog you has been an unanticipated kind of torture, this morning…”

Sherlock’s head whirled even as John kept taking in the background. He was good, not, _great_ at solving the most complex puzzles, could glance once at a room and lay it bare, but when it came to himself and other people's reactions to him, he was essentially blind, deaf and dumb. He’d known about John’s kink - a quick rummage through his room had revealed _that_ little secret - but as for how John felt about him, Sherlock…? He sucked in a deep breath, praying the oxygen would kick-start a brain gone suddenly sluggish. It didn’t.

John was still talking, and Sherlock tried to focus.

“...and as I know how you are about people, I haven't acted on it. However, this last hour has been, well, agony, Sherlock, and not the kind I like!” John looked at Sherlock’s face and surged out of the chair to grasp the taller man’s shoulders. “Sherlock? Sherlock!” As Sherlock began to hyperventilate, John guided him down to the floor, rubbing his back before fumbling, unseeing, on the counter to spill a bag of apples, bringing the paper bag down to Sherlock’s face while the apples rolled and bounced onto the floor with heavy thuds. “Breathe, just breathe, in….then out….” John encouraged. Sherlock listened to John’s voice and breathed, and breathed, and _breathed_.

When, finally, Sherlock’s head stopped buzzing and his lungs started working again, he became aware of John’s arms wrapped tight around him, one hand tangled in Sherlock’s messy curls, the other rubbing small circles on his shoulder. Through the unaccustomed feelings of safety and peace and quietness, Sherlock noticed that John’s horrible arran jumper still smelled subtly of lanolin, overlaid with the heavy floral tumble dryer sheets Mrs Hudson favoured, and the scent tickled Sherlock’s nose, making him sneeze. “Bless you,” John said quietly. Sherlock gave a wobbly smile, and John grunted a laugh. “Sherlock, I realise that in the history of the world this is probably the strangest, most unconventional, possibly inappropriate setting for a first kiss, but...may I kiss you?”

Sherlock thought carefully before replying. People, relationships, real, physical things weren't what he did well. He didn’t like not being good at things, at not knowing exactly what was happening, which was why he’d always avoided relationships (and indeed most people) like the plague. But, looking at John’s familiar, comfortable face so close to his own, feeling John’s breath warm his cheek, feeling the thump of John’s heart against his own chest, Sherlock suddenly realised that - out of all the many people he’d ever met - here was the _one_ person who not only tolerated, but liked him. Who didn’t just tolerate him for what he could do, but supported, encouraged and assisted him. The man who told him off when he was out of line, acted as a shield between Sherlock and the rest of the world, fed him, organised him, and actually _respected_ him. And on top of that, he found Sherlock sexually attractive?

Sherlock raised wide, scared eyes to John’s. The humour, affection, respect and desire in John’s gaze were clear enough for even Sherlock to see and understand. He raised a shaky hand to John’s face, feeling the deep smile creases at his mouth, the smaller, more numerous crinkles by his eyes. Stubble dragged softly at Sherlock’s palm, and the faint sheen of sweat on John’s brow dampened his fingertips. Sherlock slid his hand up further, into John’s short, thick hair. He tugged, gently.

“Yes, please,” he replied. “Please kiss me, John.”

John slowly brought his mouth down to Sherlock’s, the pair of them keeping their eyes open until the last moment. Once their lips touched, they both closed their eyes and revelled in the sensations of the kiss; the intimacy of shared breath, the slide of a tongue against teeth, the delicious sound of a lover’s broken plea. They kissed for long moments, for infinity and yet no time at all, eventually pulling apart to look at each other with similarly stunned expressions. Finally, John puffed out a laugh.

“Well,” he said. “ _Well_.”

“Eloquent as ever, John,” said Sherlock with an arched brow. Both men looked at each other, realising how right this felt. John stood up and pulled Sherlock after him, folding him into a hug which quickly devolved into a not-so-surreptitious grope. The sensation of John’s nails lightly scratching the long muscles of his back reduced Sherlock to jelly, and he gasped.

John let go and stepped back, although he was breathing hard and obviously very, _very_ aroused. He propped a hand on his hip and rubbed at his head til his hair stood up in spikes. “Well,” he said again, with a sheepish grin. “Well.” He laughed at his lack of words. “Uh...well…”

Suddenly, Sherlock’s superiority came flooding back along with his inquisitiveness. “At the risk of sounding perhaps gauche, John…” he began. John looked up, inquisitively. “Would you kindly assist me with gathering the data for my experiment now?” John’s face fell almost comically. “And then,” Sherlock said with a small, sly smile, “Could we kiss some more?”

John got right into Sherlock’s space and kissed him, hard. “Brat,” he growled. “Just...you...wait…” He led Sherlock back to the table and helped him into a spread-eagle, face-down position once more, tying and checking the ropes with cool efficiency. “Ready?”

Sherlock nodded, and braced himself as the flogger came down. He gasped.

**** It was a long, _long_ time later before either of them left the flat. John noticed the parcel, addressed to Sherlock, and brought it in. Sherlock opened it, extracting a note scrawled on a Metropolitan Police compliments slip in Lestrade’s familiar, untidy scrawl.

_Sherlock - Looks like our killer has struck again. This time, he used one of these. Does it affect your hypothesis at all? - L._

Reaching into the box, Sherlock pulled out a long, thick, purple-jelly vibrator, completely, veinily lifelike (apart from it’s virulent purpleness), and dropped it onto the table with a look of distaste. He shot a glance at John, who had a huge, filthy smirk on his face. “No, John,” Sherlock said, cursing himself for the breathy excitement in his tone. “No…”

John advanced, picking up the scary purple vibrator and handling it suggestively. Would you care to bet on that?” he said.


	2. Tinkering Quartermaster, Sneaking Spy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A very short 00Q drabbly fic, inspired by the shots of Q's workspace on the Spectre set.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This isn't my best because migraines and creativity aren't natural partners, but I promised a short a day, so here is today's.

Deep in the bowels of New Six, at a long, messy workbench lit only by a large anglepoise lamp - the only source of light in the dark, cavernous room - Q was busily tinkering with something which resembled the insane offspring of a teapot and a hard drive. He hummed Nessun Dorma as he dabbed with a miniature soldering iron at a connection then pressed a button, smiling as whatever-it-was did whatever-he-wanted. He was happily lost in his own world, and just about jumped out of his skin when somebody moved in close behind him and whispered in his ear, “Hello, lover…”

Q whirled, knocking the soldering iron over, eyes wide with fright behind his glasses. “James! When did you get back? You surprised me! What are you playing at?” He leaned over and flicked the soldering iron off as something on the desk began smoking ominously. With a furious glare Q pushed James away, grabbed his scrabble mug, and stalked over to where the kettle was on another countertop, flicking the switch to boil the water. The kettle glowed an unearthly blue and made slow clicks as it heated, and Q pulled down another mug from a cluttered shelf and rummaged for teabags - good old PG tips for himself, rooibos for James - before plopping them into the mugs. The whole time he worked, he ignored James completely. James, used to this behaviour when he acted out of order, merely folded his arms and leaned against Q’s bench with a smirk.

Steam drew Q’s fringe into little damp curls as the kettle finished boiling, and he tipped water into the mugs, added juuuust the right amount of milk, stirred, then fished the teabags out and plopped them on the countertop, where they oozed hotly. He could almost hear James's wince. He _hated_ Q’s slobbish tendencies, and this kind of thing made his skin crawl. The knowing look Q threw him as he handed over James’s mug made it clear he'd done it quite deliberately, shifting James off balance and making him uneasy. They blew on their tea and sipped in unconscious synchronicity while tea-scented steam and a tense silence wrapped around them.

“So…” Q said, “I presume this visit has a purpose, other than causing me to wreck my prototype?” He indicated the mutant teapot with his head, eyes unblinkingly trained on James, who exhaled and looked aside with a flush. Q thinned his lips and waited expectantly. 

James finished his tea and walked over to the little countertop and rinsed his mug carefully before leaving it in the sink. He wiped his hands on a (nearly clean) tea towel and walked back to Q, eyes down, body relaxed and loose. When he reached his lover, he gently took Q’s mug and put it on the worksurface, then removed Q’s glasses and slid them into the breast pocket of his own suit jacket. He clasped Q’s face loosely between his palms and simply stared into Q’s wide, unfocused eyes for a long moment. James leaned in, maintaining eye contact and exhaled into Q’s mouth as their lips met. 

Q _whimpered._

He felt James’s smile against his lips as James, unusually in their relationship, played the aggressor, deepening the kiss and crowding his body into Q’s, for once dominating the smaller man. Q went with it, melting uncharacteristically into James’s embrace and opening his mouth wider as their tongues stroked and twined. He rubbed his body up against James's, trying to force more pressure, more action, but James was in control and gave Q only as much as he, James, wanted to. 

They kissed for long, hot minutes, until both men were breathing heavily and well on their way to being aroused. James pulled away slowly, still clasping Q’s face, still maintaining eye contact. 

“I missed you,” he said, before kissing Q again. He dropped his hands and stepped back, and Q sagged. He couldn't see James's face clearly without his spex and could only read the broadest, loudest details of his body language, which made him feel strangely vulnerable. Q reached out and snagged James's hand, tugging him back in.

“I missed you too,” he said, enfolding James in a hug. Suddenly all the tension and aggression drained out of James's frame and he curled into Q, resting his head on Q’s shoulder and wrapping his strong arms around Q’s lithe body. Q pressed a soft kiss to James's temple and felt the bigger man sigh. “Home?” Q asked. James nodded, then seemed to reconsider, lifting his head to look at Q with mischievous eyes.

“Unless you want to take me hard over your desk?” he suggested with a chuckle. 

“Oh, _do_ grow up, Double-Oh Seven,” growled Q disgustedly. “We have a perfectly good bed at home, and _last_ time we tried having sex on my desk, you complained you were picking soldering wire out of your hair for a week!” He pulled his glasses out of James's pocket then reached over to flick the big anglepoise lamp off, plunging the room into absolute darkness. He navigated James through the room with total surety and slapped the button to call the lift and thought hard as a mechanism whirred into life. “But if you're good, I might pull the car over on the way home?” he proposed, and grinned triumphantly into the darkness at James's agonised groan. “Well then, James. Let's see just how good you can be, then,” he directed when the lift arrived, and slid down his zip as they got into the box to ride up to the main lobby. “You've got five floors to be very, _very_ good indeed, James…”

James smiled beatifically and dropped to his knees. “In five floors, I can be absolutely fucking _excellent_ , Q,” he said, and leaned in. 

Q gasped at the faint touch of teeth and the wet, hot suction. “Fucking. Excellent!” he agreed breathlessly. “Four floors to go, James!”

By the time the lift arrived in the lobby, James had achieved superlative status, the Quartermaster was a dishevelled wreck, and both men had ridiculous grins on their faces.


	3. Hitch Hiker's guide to Middle Earth

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ok, this seemed clever to my sleep-deprived brain...
> 
> Using Martin Freeman (Bee's favourite) in another guise and mashing up HHGTTG and a Middle Earth where Thorin is protesting the destruction of a mighty oak to make was for an elf bypass...
> 
> I'm sorry. Don't hate me :)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thorin saving an OAK. Because OAKENSHIELD.
> 
> I should try sleeping, shouldn't I?

From Thorin’s Diary:

_I’ve been peacefully occupying this tree for six weeks now with my fellow Warriors, and I believe we are wearing the council down. The trolldozers sit idle with nothing to destroy, the human workmen in their fluorescent vests drinking tea, reading Orcish Newspapers (‘for the articles’) and sneaking off for a pipe or three, and the gawkers flock and eddy like bored seagulls. Occasionally they’ll send down somebody from the High Council, clipboard in hand, hardhat on as they squeak up at us through a tinny loudhailer, but there’s been no real threat to our mission to save this magnificent, four-hundred-year-old oak from being hacked down to make room for yet _another_ hyper-elf bypass. And I thought the elves **liked** trees!_

However, dwarves were not designed to live in trees, and I miss the feel of the earth beneath my feet and between my fingers. Despite the nobility of my cause, I find myself wishing for a compromise to be reached so that I can touch terra firma again.

*******

“Uh, hello, the tree! Might I speak to whoever’s in charge?”

Thorin roused himself from his nap with a groan, hearing the other dwarves grumble as he shifted and made the branch sway, laughing painfully as Ori nearly toppled off of his branch, grabbing on at the last minute with a yelp before Nori pulled him back up. Peering down through the wide limbs of the tree, Thorin saw a small, tidy man clad in pajamas stood at the roots. “What do you want?” Thorin called down with a yawn.

“I wondered if I could ask you to come to the pub for a quick chat,” the man stated. It wasn’t really a question. Thorin, ever curious, looked at his company for their opinions. Balin grumbled, but he did that a lot. Bofur put his thumbs up and merely requested Thorin bring back a round for everyone. Bombur requested pie and mash and a bag of pork scratchings, and that was it. With a shrug, Thorin climbed down the ancient tree, dropping from the spreading, leafy branches before the small man. He looked up at Thorin with wide, innocent eyes which were still somehow very obviously annoyed. His thick brows came together over his nose and he scowled. “Come with me,” he said before turning on his bare, hairy feet and stalking away towards the pub.

Once they were settled with _six_ pints of bitter and a several bags of lembas between them, the smaller man spoke. “I need you to listen and not interrupt,” he said. Considering he’d not even spoken, Thorin thought this was a bit rich, but the bitter was cool and nicely tangy, so he merely nodded in a kingly fashion and sipped at his drink.

“My name is Arthur Dent,” said the man. I woke up this morning in my house in Little Cottington to find it scheduled for demolition. Following on from a series of frankly unbelievable events, I found myself aboard a spaceship - um, a sky-vessel,” he attempted to clarify at Thorin's blank look. It didn’t help. “Anyway, there I was, when after yet more unbelievable events, I was ejected into the vacuum of space and found myself here. The fish in my ear (Thorin stared, this was getting stranger by the second) helped me understand that you’re in a similar situation to my own, so I came to help.” Thorin gaped, bitter forgotten.

“I’m terribly sorry,” he said politely, “but is this Thursday? I never _could_ get the hang of Thursdays…”

The small man, Arthur, smiled. “It’s always Thursday somewhere,” he said philosophically. “Anyway,” he straightened the small towel he had draped over his shoulder. “I’m here to save you.”

“From what?”

“Well, it turns out that the Vogons - who only recently obliterated my home planet - are, in fact, capable of travelling between dimensions and between reality and fantasy, and are even as we speak on their way to, um, blow up Middle Earth to make way for a hyperdimensional bypass.”

Thorin goggled. Arthur pulled a strange, metallic box from the pocket of his robe and thumbed it, the front lighting up with a rattly beeping noise. It spoke garbled words of nonsense, which Arthur nodded at, then he stood. “Come on,” he ordered, drink up. “I’m afraid we won't have time to rescue your company, but I understand they will have fine careers in an alternate dimension, if that’s any consolation.”

Just then, screams from outside the pub drew Thorin’s attention. He shoved back and ran outside to see the sky filled with a craft of unspeakable immensity and unearthly design. A voice, vaster than anything his ears or mind could comprehend, spoke with tones of ultimate boredom. “Um, people of Middle Earth, this is Prostetnic Vogon Jeltz of the Interdimensional Hyperspace Planning Council. As you are probably aware, plans for the development of the outlying regions of reality involve the building of a hyperdimensional express route through your star system. scheduled for demolition.”

More screams, Thorin’s among them, rose towards the sky. Arthur sighed. “Ah, deja vu,” he said enigmatically. Thorin shot him a glance. “Look, to save time,” he suggested, “Put this fish in your ear _now_...” he slipped a small, ugly fish into Thorin's ear and howling, rushing wind filled his ears, bringing him to his knees, crushing him, until suddenly, with a little pop, it all stopped. He pushed to his feet and glared at Arthur. 

“What. Was. _THAT_?” he whispered. Arthur shushed him with a gesture, the sky vessel was still speaking and now the people around them were crying, falling to the ground. Thorin listened, but it seemed that the voice was no longer blithely talking about the demolition of Middle Earth but instead delivering some kind of a poem. “Not bad,” Thorin said, and Arthur looked at him with surprise.

“Not bad?” He exclaimed. “Vogon poetry is the worst in the galaxy!”

“Ha! Remind me to introduce you to a man I know called Tom Bombadil,” laughed Thorin darkly. “This is nothing, believe me!” Suddenly, Arthur grabbed his hand. 

“Time to go,” he said, and, “I’m so, so sorry…” Just as the sky-vessel lit up with the light of a thousand suns, heat washing over Middle Earth with blistering, destructive force, Thorin felt every single part of himself being torn apart, slammed back together, stretched and twisted and tortured for an everlasting moment, and then it stopped. He groaned, rolled over and was horribly sick before opening his eyes to see a large, white room, the only occupant of which was a tall man with...Thorin stared, disbelieving… _two_ heads!

“Uh, hi,” the man said, lifting a cup to his lips. “Ugh, _tea_ ,” he said. “Arthur, frood, what have you done to my spaceship?” He cupped the mug in both hands, then _lifted another hand to scratch at his right nose!_ Thorin, his mind awhirl, lay back abruptly on the shining floor of the unimaginable room.

“Poor chap,” said Arthur with quiet sympathy. “I know how I felt. And trust me,” he said,shooting a disgusted look at the three-armed, two-headed tea drinker, “Being shot into the vacuum of space is far preferable to spending time with _this_ one. It’s tea, Zaphod,” he addressed the room’s other occupant. “Because,” he looked for some reason at his wrist, “Nine-thirty in the morning is too early for pan-galactic gargle blasters!”

“It’s never too early, man,” Zaphod replied. “COmputer?”

“Hi!” gushed a nasally, disembodied voice. “How can I help you?”

Zaphod gave a disgusted sigh. “Ugh, nothing. Just send metal-man along with three gargle blasters, would you?”

“Sure thing!” chirped the voice.

“Not for me, Zaphod, I told you it’s too early,” said Arthur wearily, as a door hissed open in the blank, bright wall. Something - a man, no, it couldn’t be, but not a troll, nor a hobbit - walked in, holding a tray with three smoking goblets upon it.

“Brain the size of a planet, and you’ve got me acting the waiter,” the thing droned in a voice which made Thorin want, suddenly, to cry. It moved with excruciating slowness over to Zaphod and handed him the tray before walking sadly back out. Zaphod gave one of the goblets to Thorin. 

“Drink up!” he instructed with two wide smiles. Thorin took a huge mouthful, and just before his brain closed down utterly, he heard Arthur say, “What did you do that for?” Sadly, he didn’t hear Zaphod’s reply, as the darkness took him.


	4. Earpieces and Earworms

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Super-short, silly 00Q ficlet.

Q’s earpiece crackles, then James speaks, breathless yet unhurried.

“Q?”

“Yes, Double-Oh Seven?”

“I appear to have (grunt) destroyed that prototype car you gave me to field test (gasp).” 

“...and…?”

“What do you mean, 'and’?” _Bullets sound distantly, there are three loud shots, a man yells._

“Why should I be surprised? You _always_ destroy my prototypes. I stopped giving you genuine prototypes shortly after I became Q.”

“What? Bastard! Not you, Q, the Armenian just tried winging me. What do you mean, 'you don't give me genuine prototypes?’”

“Exactly what I said, James. You get the, uh, prototypes of the prototypes. I hold regular challenges for the minions to design kit which we send out with you to see if it's viable to manufacture and give to our less...accident prone...agents for genuine testing. It keeps them motivated, and, really, you're and excellent litmus test for kit viability”

“Bastard! That one _was_ at you, Q.”

“I've been called worse,” Q says calmly, sipping his tea, fingers flying across his keyboard. “Are you near extraction, yet?”

“Not quite. There's more people in the compound than Intel suggested. I'm looking for an alternative. Any suggestions?’

“Checking now, give me...two minutes.” Q is unhurried: they've done this how many times before? They're a well-oiled machine, he and 007, even - no, especially - separated by so many miles. He listens to the usual noises of a messy extraction, idly wondering if he'll need to hack satellite feeds to destroy evidence. _Again._ “James, status?”

_Feet pound, James's heavy breaths fill Q’s ears, and more shots sound. He swears, then there is total silence; even the ambient crackle of the radio signal stops._

 _After ten minutes, as per protocol, Q speaks. His voice is a little less clipped, a little less sharp. Uncertain, almost._

“Double-Oh Seven?”

Nothing.

The continuing silence is total. Devastatingly loud. Q thins his lips, taps out commands with faintly shaking fingers, despatches minions with outward calm. He keeps his earpiece in and one eye on the clock as the seconds seems to warp into hours before him. He works and he watches, watches and works.

Suddenly, his earpiece squeals so loudly that even the minions look up. Q rips it from his ear with a muffled curse and drops it on the keyboard as it continues to shrill. After a good fifteen seconds it falls silent, and Q gingerly reinserts it. He smiles when the reassuring sound of static fills his ear once more, followed by Queen’s _Another One Bites the Dust_ and faintly, helicopter rotors.

“Double-Oh Seven?”

“Extraction achieved, Q. Sorry about the silence; it's probably this sub-standard kit you keep giving me…”

This time the silence is Q’s as he pinches his nose and counts to ten, then factors the square root of several large primes. He exhales loudly before smiling a tight, wicked grin, and tapping out a line of code. There is a string of loud, inventive swearwords released in his ear 

“Q?”

“ _Yes_ , Double-Oh Seven?”

“I’m sorry, Q.”

“What for, Double-Oh Seven?”

“Everything, Q, I promise!”

“Thank you, James.”

There's a taut moment. Q counts under his breath, _...eight, nine…_

“Q, I said sorry, I meant it, now _please_ stop my watch from playing the _Tellytubbies_ theme!”


	5. Scars

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Q and James get couple tattoos...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, I woke up at two a.m, and this was in my head.
> 
> Sorry for the gap in posting, Bee x

“You...absolute… _bastard_!”

James's voice rang over the pervasive, nerve-jangling buzz of the tattoo machine. The artist working on him grinned, and dabbed at the mingled blood and ink before reapplying the needle to the tiny design she was marking out on his right shoulder blade. Q, on an adjacent chair having a similar design engraved on his _left_ shoulder, grinned into his folded arms and breathed away the burning sting of the needle.

Not too long afterwards, both men were inked: James’s tattoo virginity finally taken, and Q’s willingly surrendered. Their respective artists carefully wiped down their skin and showed each man their back in a mirror. Q beamed delightedly and turned to look at James, who was looking back over his shoulder like he couldn't quite believe what he saw. James looked up at his smiling husband and his eyes softened, looking at Q’s excitement. Q actually felt his heart go 'thump’, just looking at James's eyes crinkle and the deep dimples in his cheeks. Once they had been wrapped and had redressed, James and Q received their aftercare instructions which James promptly ignored and which Q committed to memory. Having paid, they left the shop to go home.

A few hours later, Q stood in the bathroom unwrapping his grumbling husband's shoulder with near-trembling hands. “It's a bit like Christmas,” he said with a small, excited grin. 

“Strange, I don't remember Christmas hurting like a bitch,” commented James.

“For heaven's sake, James, you've been _shot_ ,” replied Q with asperity. “Not three months ago, you used a pen knife to dig a bullet out of your pectoral muscle _in the staff toilets_! Stop being such a baby!” He peeled the cellophane back from the tattoo and quickly used the moistened cotton wool he held in his other hand to press lightly against the design which now looked bubbly and messy where James's body worked to assimilate or reject the ink of the tattoo.

James winced and hissed. “That's an entirely different pain, Q. What kind of madman _asks_ someone to scar them for life and pays for the privilege?”

He kept on bellyaching as Q mostly ignored him, quickly- and gently, taking into account James's sudden frailty- cleaned up the mess and smoothed a special moisturiser onto James's sore shoulder before dropping a quick kiss to the nape of his neck, meeting his eyes in the mirror over the bathroom sink. “All done, brave boy.”

James glared at him. “Don't patronise me, Q,”

Q gazed back with the limpid, innocent gaze he used to mask his deepest thoughts and merely kissed James's neck again. “As if I would! I'm shocked you'd think that of me, beloved…”

Turning, James reversed their positions and returned the favour, cleaning and moisturising Q with brisk efficiency. His hands were deft and confident as he doctored his silent, smiling husband, looking over his shoulder to gaze with burning blue eyes at Q's reflected face. Q bore this attention with silent joy, loving James's hands on him in any capacity, but especially when he showed his gentler, nurturing side. In no time, James was finished, dropping a kiss on the bony knob of Q's shoulder. “Finished, my stoic love.”

“Shall we look, then?” Q suggested. He didn't know why he was so excited. They'd deliberated long and hard over the details of the design; James arguing that although a couple tattoo was a sweet idea in theory, in actuality it couldn't be too distinctive in his line of work, and Q contesting that it should at least be meaningful, and not generic. 

“Come on then,” James smiled. 

They turned their backs to the mirror and wrapped an arm about each other's waist so that their tattoos were close together, and looked back over their shoulders. There was no sound other than their breathing as they took in the picture they made: James, broadly muscled and scarred, his ropy-tendoned arm about the slender, almost waifish waist of Q. And, close together on their shoulders, two tattoos, tiny, simple, near-identical. _Meaningful_.

James's was a small square, edges rounded, cleverly shaded and highlighted to make it appear three-dimensional. On the lower right-handed corner of the mostly-blank square was a small ‘10’. 

And on Q’s nearly identical scrabble tile (for that's what the tattoos were) there was no numerical value, but a simple, black 'J’.

He sighed and turned away from their reflection to lean into James. “We're a matched set, now,”

“That we are,” James rumbled. “That we are.”


	6. Hunting

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's not all death and mayhem for double-oh seven. Sometimes there's recon and capture missions like this one.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ***EXTREMELY DAFT***  
> Trying to improve my dialogue. Inspired by my trip out with my youngest son before seven this morning.

“This whole mission ***pant*** is a waste of my time, you know that, don’t you?”

“You know this has to be done, Double-Oh Seven, so do it.”

“Don’t take that tone of voice with _me_ , Quartermaster, it doesn’t work.”

“Well, someone has to be prepared to keep you in line, else you run wild, now, don’t you?”

“Cheeky bastard! ***gasp*** OK, fine. Where next?”

“One more flight of stairs, take a left, and there should be a door.”

“I… ***pant*** still have doubts ***gasp***...about the validity of this mission, Q.”

“Ours not to reason why, Double-Oh Seven, ours is but to do or…”

“ _Tennyson_ , Q? _Really_?!”

“It seemed appropriate for the situation. Don’t you think?”

“God, ***pant*** it turns me on when you’re prim.”

“May I remind you we’re on open comms at the moment?”

“So? Everyone in the office ***pant*** has heard me fucking targets, if not watched; a little bit ***wheeze*** of dirty talk won’t even make them look up from their sudoku….Right, ***pant*** I’m here. What now?”

“I need you to hold the scanner and turn in a slow circle. Tell me if you get a ping, please. I’m still not sure it’s here, even…”

“Great. Just, great. I love a wild goose chase. Doing it now, Q...nothing...nothing...hang on, there’s something, I’ll need to move in slightly… _there_! A clear ping, Q What now?”

“ _ **Yes**_! Right, centre the camera, and fire.”

“Bear with me. Shit!”

“Don’t worry if you miss, try again.”

“Yes, yes, I _do_ know how to shoot, Q, remember?”

“This is outside your… _usual_ realm of expertise, _Old Man_...”

“I may be old, but at least I’m not sat on my backside reading _The Beano_ , am I?” 

“ ***sigh*** Is this yet more of your famed banter? I’m unimpressed, James. Have you succeeded yet?”

“No, it’s proving difficult: right, firing again, aaaaaaaand, yes! Got it! Target acquired, Q.”

“ ** _Brilliant_**! You’d better come back to base now, James.”

“Do you think M will approve of you using Double-Ohs and governmental resources for this, Q?”

“I am certain of it, Double-Oh Seven,”

“Ah, afternoon, M. That’s good news. It’ll be a change not to be hauled over the carpet on my return.”

“For me too. Congratulations on a successful mission. Might I ask what was acquired this time?”

“It was...let me check the Pokedex, Sir...here we go, it’s an Articuno. Is that good?”

“Yes, Double-Oh Seven, very good indeed. I’ll see you in my office on your return. Handing you back to the Quartermaster now.”

“Very good, Sir. Glad to be of assistance, Sir.”

“James?”

“Yes, Q?”

“Remember what I told you; avoid small children with handheld devices on the way home, and _no_ fighting other trainers. We need this Pokemon back safely!”

“Give me a common-or-garden psychopath with a laser any day, Q. This is ridiculous.”

“ _Bond_!”

“ _If I should die, think only this of me: That there’s some corner of a foreign field that is forever England…_ ”

“Melodrama. How lovely.”

“I can quote Brooke if you can quote Tennyson.”

“You can quote the lyrics to the Mr. Blobby Christmas number one, just _get that Pokemon home_ : MI5 are currently ahead of us, and the honour of Six is at stake!”

“You’ve all gone quite, quite, mad, you know that?”

“Just. Get. Home.”

“Message received. On way. Over.

“Over and out.”


End file.
